Soakaway Crates

What do I need When Building a Soakaway?

When building a soakaway crate for infiltration you will need:

• Soakaway Crates
• Geotextile Membrane (permeable)
• Silt Trap
• Drainage Pipe
• Something to dig a hole - shovel or digger

You can purchase all the components needed to build your soakaway If you purchase our 1 cubic metre soakaway set, then this will come with enough geotextile membrane to wrap all of the outward faces of the soakaway. If you purchase a kit with a silt trap included, then you will also get a pre-filter which should be used up stream of the membrane wrapped soakaway crates.

Rainsmart Ellipse and STM 65T Heavy Soakaway Crates

Our innovative Rainsmart Soakaway Crates have been superbly engineered ranges of stormwater products. With vertical load ratings of up to 85 tonnes and an industry-leading lateral loading of 18 tonnes our Rainsmart systems are suitable for all types of applications including infiltration, attenuation and rainwater recycling.

Polydrain Hydrocell 62T Soakaway Crates

Our Polydrain Hydrocell Soakaway Crates boast a tonne loading of 62 tonnes and an impressive 950 litres of storage per cubic metre! They're a great option for commercial or domestic installations alike.

Flat-Packed Or Pre-Assembled Options

Due to their bulky nature, traditionally, both merchants and installers have suffered from crates taking up space on site and expensive distribution costs. Our flat-packed options offer customers a way around this and the great news is they’re really easy to assemble with a one cubic metre taking approximately 12 minutes for one person to assemble.

Modular Nature Easily Allows Different Depths

Rainsmart Soakaway Crates come in a range of depths due to the modular nature of the crates. If your project is in an area of heavy soil or in an area where the water table is higher than normal, consider using a shallow crate. This type of crate is popular for those excavating by hand as digging can be a laborious process and is hard work.

If your project is an area where space is tight then you may wish to opt for a deeper crate such as our triple option. The deeper crate allows you to add more cubic metreage in size with smaller footprint.

Soakaway Maintenance – Inspection & Cleaning

Our prefilters include silt traps and catchpit chambers, which can both be used within the drainage network upstream of the soakaway in order to catch debris and silt before it enters the system to avoid any build-up which could lead to your soakaway working inefficiently or even becoming blocked.

Using our Rainsmart crates you can also create a linear inspection channel within the soakaway itself. This channel can then be isolated using twinwall pipe or geotextile membrane in order to collect debris and silt (in much the same way as a silt trap or catchpit). This channel should then be accessible via an inspection chamber so that any unwanted materials can either be flushed out of the channel or sucked up.

How Many Soakaway Crates Do I Need?

The number of soakaway crates needed is dependent on the size of soakaway you need to install. The most common soakaway size in residential settings is 1 cubic metre – this is what is specified by most local authorities. As a broad rule – a soakaway 1 cubic metre has always been sufficient to drain 50 square metres of roof area under normal conditions.

Local authorities in recent years have however been more specific with their sizing requirements to ensure that all properties have suitable soakaways design based on local rainfall and soil conditions.

The number of crates needed depends on the depth of the Rainsmart crate that you use so there will be less triple or standard crates needed for the same size in cubic metres. The table below can help you understand this further.

Installing Your Soakaway Crates

1. Carry out a soil percolation test to check that the soil is suitable for a soakaway
2. Mark out your excavation and then dig your trench – making sure that it is deep and wide enough to allow for back and sidefill
3. Prepare the soakaway base removing any large stones, roots or flints before introducing 150mm of sharp sand for the crates to sit on. This should be compacted down and levelled out so there are no visible undulations
4. Lay your impermeable membrane in your excavation – this will protect the soakaway by preventing any soil or sand particles from entering the crate structure
5. If you have a flat-packed crate then you should build your crate – take a look at our assembly video. It’s a simple process and should only take approximately 2 minutes per crate.
6. Once assembled lay your crates into your excavation on top of the membrane